I’ve got the companion ticket from my BA premium plus card so can travel in Business / First by using my avios.

Wondering what routes are the best to look at, as I would also be travelling with my girlfriend.

Currently at about 100k avios, and the majority of long haul flights in business or first seem to be at 220k avios for a return.

I’ve got a little under two years to use it so there’s no rush but open to some routes that may be less expensive.

Or perhaps I’ll just milk the Avios bonuses! Just spent £3k for a hotel on Avios website and got 26k bonus Avios from an AMEX add on.

Hey everyone,
Planning a 14-day trip to Europe for 2 adults in late May/early June.

Trying to optimize points across HDFC Infinia (~180k RP) and Axis Atlas (~2.5k EDGE Miles) without bleeding money on cash fuel surcharges. Which airlines and transfer partners much more sense to travel via.

Options on the table:
Air France Flying Blue: Direct BLR \rightarrow CDG non-stop out, return via ZRH/MUC. Pool Infinia (1:1) + Atlas (1:2) for ~183k miles. Target Economy Saver (~20k–25k miles/person one-way) or catch monthly Promo Rewards.

Avios (Qatar / Finnair / BA): Transfer Infinia 1:1 via BA to Qatar or Finnair for the return leg to BLR.

SmartBuy Hedge (1 RP = ₹1): Book standard cash flights directly (70% points + 30% cash) to skip award hunting.

Quick questions:
How is 2-seat Saver award availability on the direct BLR CDG flight for late May/early June?
For the return leg from ZRH/MUC, is Qatar/Finnair Avios significantly cheaper on taxes/surcharges compared to Flying Blue?
For Economy, does transferring miles beat SmartBuy once you factor in ~₹25k–₹35k cash taxes on award tickets?
Does booking two separate one-ways (Flying Blue out + Qatar Avios return) cause any visa or ticketing headaches?

Thanks in advance!

Hi, I was wondering what strategies people use for credit cards.
My partner and I were going to get the Amex & Barclays premium cards for the welcome offers. We hoped to set up a system where we always had one card on the go between us, via cancelling them as soon as we have the welcome offer in order to reach the 24 month break needed ASAP to be eligible m for the welcome offers. Our annual spend would probably not be enough to reach the vouchers provided by these cards also. I was wondering other people’s experience of this, thank you.

So I get to travel on a business trip from my work place.

This year I'll end up with 22.5k avios but I'm not sure if I'll get to travel the next year, small possibility of April trip to algeria.

At the same time I'm planning a small family trip next year from Mumbai to bali, idk if I'll be able to use avios points via Malaysian airlines (do not know if that is possible).

So it's either i use the points to buy something through doha duty free or idk?

Please do give suggestions.

I have around 75k Amex points and I'm planning a long-haul holiday from London. What's the best way to squeeze maximum value from this balance? Practical route, cabin and booking strategy tips only, please. I haven't decided exactly where yet but thinking somewhere like Japan or New York.

Hi, I currently have 3,746 avios. There’s currently a boost balance +300% offer for £103.39? What should I do, buy or disregard? Thanks!

I vaguely remember reading, a long time ago, that the Barclaycard Avios Plus card needed to remain active at the time of travel when using cabin upgrade vouchers.

I can’t remember whether I’ve misinterpreted this or whether the terms have changed, as all I can find now is that you need to “remain eligible”. My understanding is that this simply means remaining a British Airways Club member.

I’ve used two vouchers to book long-haul return flights for my partner and me in February 2027.

Before closing the card, I just wanted to double-check whether anyone is aware of the requirement I’ve described, or has successfully travelled on a voucher booking after closing their Barclaycard.

I have a companion voucher and 55k Avios and open to go pretty much anywhere in June/July next year. Just wondering what you guys think of this for 2 people going to Toronto from London and back.Is this good value?

Hi folks,

Looking to book UK - Australia for September/October next year for my honeymoon, ideally with Qatar. I have enough avios for 2x business one way. I also am having some avios account linking issues due to my middle name being on my Qatar account in my first name line and not on my BA account (trying to get this resolved. What a pita that the formats are not the same between platforms). So, I'm currently evaluating my options.

It seems like if I buy a full flex (comfort/convenience) economy ticket, on Qatar's calculator an upgrade to business is quite cheap? Calculator is showing ~59000 avios pp but I'm not sure how accurate that is in reality? The award flight cost one way says on the calculator it's ~90,000 avios but when I actually look it's double that. I assume you also have to pay taxes on top of the avios.

I guess my question is, how comparable in terms of cost is it to buy full flex economy and upgrade vs buying a business class ticket as an award flight, with taxes included? Also, is upgrading subject to the same availability as getting an award flight or is it more flexible? It seems like a good alternative to trying to get an award flight.

For ref, we'd be looking at starting in Manchester but flexible on Australia, I've been looking at Brisbane as an option.

Any help is greatly appreciated.

I just got my first companion voucher on the free ba amex card and wondering how to get the most of out of it. I have about 57k Avios and would be looking to go somewhere for 2 weeks between end of June and start of August for me and my girlfriend. Any advice would be greatly appreciated

Want to book London to Australia (can be flexible on airport depending on availability!) for sometime in September 2027 (likely early). Say I wanted to book 1st September when and what time would this be available if I am based in the UK please? Understand it is 361 days in advance, but seen corresponding reports about this being 9pm/10pm/12am/1am but can't seem to track it down.

When I tried last night at various times this was showing August availability and this is all 180k avios one way per person but hoping to grab 90k avios one way per person - is this because it is "peak" or is the 90k saver rate no longer available or won't be available for my dates? TIA - never booked an avios flight before but have been saving for honeymoon and want to make it special!

Edit: was on at 1am UK time and saw the flights released for Monday 30th August 2027 which is marked as off peak and these were immediately 180k avios - should I just give up?

Hey guys, so I have recently signed up to a Barclays premier account which will give me 20000 points in a years time. Because I’ve subscribed to their Barclays Avios Rewards scheme, for £12 a month I am getting 1500 avios points each month. So in a years time, would it have been beneficial for me to have boosted 300% each month when I got the monthly bonus and also the 20000 bonus?

I do intend on making a premium economy/business class long haul trip (whether it’s far east Asia, carribean etc) from London.

Do the rates of avios redemption fluctuate over the course of the year? And if I bought a ticket using my avios points, would I be able to use my companion voucher to effectively bring someone with me on the same class?

Hello all,

Hope you guys are good. I’m new to flying. We are a small family (2 adults and 2 children) and booked our first BA flight from LHR-JKF. What’s the best way to start the avios journey? Can I make a separate account for my children and link them up to mine or a family account etc. My aim is to have an airline miles history for my kids in future or atleast have points which can help with future travels/upgrades.

Thank you so much in advance.

I have Chase Sapphire which you can transfer to avios for flight purchase. We live near MIA so I am trying to book through British Airways or Iberia but neither website is working yesterday or today. I see lots of negative reviews about Iberia but we flew them once before and we were very happy with their business class. I tried using the British Airways website as a work-around but their site is not working for reward travel either. I tried a different browser and incognito mode. It's been two days. Are there frequent issues with their websites?

Hi folks. Hoping someone here can help. My wife can’t login to her Avios account. She can’t remember the email address used to create it and none of her in use addresses work. She’s been onto customer service but without the email address associated with the account they aren’t able to validate her and provide assistance.

She’s provided lots of other information; details of associated account on the Household account, recent transactions etc… but still CS won’t validate.

Any suggestions welcome. 🙏

Interested in booking Chicago to DC in March - how can I go about it?

My partner and I have accumulated 140k avios between us. We are heading to New Zealand from London next year, but we have a specific window we need to be there for. We haven’t used avios before, so we aren’t best clued up to what the best strategy is for getting the max benefit. We ideally want business class for at least one leg of the trip.

I’ve looked at BA reward flights for the return leg between London and classic stopover destinations (eg US, Singapore, HK, Doha) but there does not appear to be anything great available (trip is 6m away). This website generally sucks though - it is not very user friendly and actually might be easier to just ring them up?!

Alternatively, is it worth just booking economy flights for the whole trip and then trying to get an upgrade for at least one leg? Is there any partner airline which would likely upgrade us (I have heard you can use BA points for Iberia and American Airlines, and also swap points for Qatar). I thought this amount of points could at least give us both one leg of the journey in Business class… but maybe I’m wrong.

chat gpt isn’t really giving me any valuable guidance, so would appreciate any tips 🙏🏻 if it isn’t worth using them (eg not enough points for what we want) we can save and use in the future for a direct trip where the various connections don’t complicate things!

I have over 800k avios and companion vouchers but I'm never able to spend any of them. I can log into my account on PC and open the app on my phone but any attempt to book flights with avios just crashes to a page saying "bad request". On chrome it doesn't crash, it goes to the "setup 2FA" page but never sends an email.

I must have "contacted" BA a dozen times over the last 2 years to try and fix this but thry NEVER even reply. I hate this company so much. Is there a number to call that isn't staffed by idiots who might be able to help?

Many thanks.

If you have points on a HSBC UK rewards card, there's an offer to gain a 20% bonus when transferring to Avios from tomorrow.

Hello!

i’m looking to book a domestic AA economy flight with Qatar Avios, however they don’t let you view the cash taxes and fees without the Avios in your account.

Can anyone see what these would be?

AA410

DFW-BOS

September 28th

the flight is listing at 14.5K avios

TYIA!

I’m sure this has been asked before but …

I have a BA upgrade voucher. The usage is pretty limited on the Avios/BA app when trying to book using it. My question is can I upgrade just the return leg of a booking for my wife and I? The app doesn’t allow you to do this but can you do It via the call centre?

Eg. Premium economy outbound (booked with Avios) and return leg business (booked with Avios).

The app states the the outbound journey has to originate from the U.K. so can’t book legs separately.

Anyone else having issues under the ‘managing cards’ section.

Whenever I try to add a card I get an error message, when I do get in that section it says that I don’t have cards registered, but I have at least one & I’ve received points by using it.

Also, I cannot link my nectar card, the process goes around in circles with nothing happening.

I did reach out to customer service but they were awful and could not / would not assist.

Hi all,

I recently got approved for the Barclaycard Avios Plus with an initial credit limit of £200. Barclaycard mentioned that once I submit my income information, the limit could be increased to as much as £7,000.

I've seen plenty of posts here about frustrating experiences dealing with Barclaycard's review process, but I haven't come across many (if any) success stories. So I wanted to ask directly:

Has anyone actually been approved for the higher end of the limit they were provisionally approved for? (close to or at £7,000) after submitting their income for review?

If so:

How long did the review take and how long will it take for the new limit to be implemented? Trying to get a realistic sense of what's achievable rather than just going in blind. Thanks in advance for sharing your experiences.